Snowflakes=FUN!

Uuhmmm... yah, so I kinda like making snowflakes.  :) 

Christmas Reading Chart

On Sunday I had the idea to read the four gospels of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) throughout the month of December as a way of keeping me focused on what Christmas is really about for me and draw closer to the Savior.   I began this week instead of waiting for December (I guess I was just too excited). :)  I figured out that if I wanted to pace myself, I needed to read about 6 pages a day to finish on Christmas Eve.  For anyone that wants to start after Thanksgiving they would need to read about 7 pages a day.

As I began reading in the mornings this last week I realized how much more special it would be to read it to my girls.  They like to get ready for school quickly and spend the rest of the morning reading, practicing instruments, animating, or drawing.  I let them know that they didn't have to participate, but if they wanted to listen I would be in the family room reading out loud and they could draw near me and listen.  It has been very special to begin this and I really look forward to the rest of the Christmas season starting our mornings in such a quiet, special way.

Because I'm such a dorky/goal-oriented/visual kind of gal I googled if there was any sort of chart to color in for reading the 4 gospels.  I couldn't find one, but I did find a chart of the entire New Testament with the Wise Men like above.  I brought it into photoshop and created my own chart inside it to be for just the four gospels and wrote "The Wise Still Seek Him" in the papyrus font.  I put it here so anyone could use it that would like to.

I hope you have a very Merry Season. :)

Winter Bulletin Board

Looks like my snowflake making skills came in handy when I made this bulletin board this week for the girls I teach in church ages 12-18.  I love them!  (I blacked out the middle section of the board for privacy sake)

Our Family Halloween Silhouettes

These are the little Halloween silhouettes I made of my family for Halloween this year.  I like them so much I think they will become a permanent decoration going up our staircase.  :)  I know, I'm so strange.  haha   I saw these lazer-cut wood decorations at a craft store and knew immediately what they would become.  I took profile photos of each member of my family and blacked it out in Photoshop.  I then found Halloween images I liked in Google and transposed them over our heads keeping our same profiles.  I printed those out, cut them and traced it onto black cardstock and cut that out.  I know there are more simple ways of doing this idea (ie. owning a Silhouette or Cricut machine), this is just the way my cheapness and brain worked it out to do it and I think they turned out quite charming. :) Happy Halloween!

So Much Halloween!

This year's costumes!  Makenzie helped sew her vampire dress.  Kendyl's costume is one that Makenzie used a few years ago (Wednesday from the Addam's Family).  Pip is the Ghost With A Black Eye (I sewed that ghost costume a few years ago for Kendyl).  If you don't know what that is a reference to I don't blame you. hahaha   It is Penelope's favorite story for us to tell.  She's been having us tell her it over and over since she was 2.  It's basically as story of a family who moves into a haunted house.  In the basement in the closet is a ghost with a black eye that scares everyone, except the very youngest little girl (whom we always have said was named Pip).  At the end the little girl scares the ghost by saying he better get out of there or she'll give him another black eye.  Pip always cheers at this part and jumps around. :)

Here's a close up of my creepy little ghost.  Her black eye makeup got rubbed off just before our little photo shoot because Penelope tripped and cried and rubbed it all off.  We were running late for a party so there was no time to reapply.  

Here's another one... a little less creepy... and a whole lot more cute.

Here's a lunch sack Seth drew one time of the story.  Pip kept this taped on her wall by her bed for years she loved this drawing so much.

Onto my even creeper Kendyl.  That girl knows how to get in character...

eek!

Here she is showing a more tender side- giving her little sissy a kiss. :) 

Last of all, Makenzie the vampire!

eek!  She gets into character too!

She did such a fabulous job on this dress.  She put hours into this sucker  (me too!)  It was worth it! :)

My favorite Halloween decoration this year is something my husband drew on one of our girl's lunch sacks.

IT'S FABULOUS!

It's of them in the same position as one of the stretching portraits in Disney's Haunted Mansion.

It is framed and in our music room.  :)

Happy Halloween!

The Great Colonial Day Trick!

Oh this girl!  My Kendyl Bendyl.  How could I get angry at that face you ask?  I'll tell you why... :)

 She's got the most amazing hair.  I love when she lets me do fun stuff with it.

For the past few months Kendyl has been so excited and working on a dress for her Colonial Day Celebration at her school.  We went to the store and I let her pick out what fabric and trims she wanted and she helped me cut it out and sew some of it.  As far as I knew everyone was just rounding up whatever they had or borrowing costumes for the celebration.  Kendyl was excited about the idea of designing and creating her own dress.  Well... the day before the Colonial Fair I got a note reminding the kids to dress up and it specifically said "plain, dull colors of browns, grays, blacks, and whites."  I asked Kendyl if she knew about that and she admitted that they had told them to use dull colors months ago, but she didn't want to tell me that because she wanted an amazing dress.  She even  told me that they had passed out costumes for the kids to borrow and that they had enough supplies that no one had to buy or sew anything, but she had told them that we would just make hers.  Whaaaaaa?  A little shocked, I asked why she didn't share this information with me and she replied that she doesn't mind being the only girl in bright pretty colors and that she will stand out like Cinderella and isn't that such a great idea?!  hahaha  OH THIS GIRL! 

So she had her marvelous Cinderella moment.  I've always wanted one of those. :) People followed her around all day and took pictures of her.  She couldn't have been happier.  I'm not sure her feet touched the floor as she glided through the hallways of her school that morning in a sea of dully colored costumes. haha  They did activities and games and even danced.  There wasn't an even ratio of boys to girls so she lucked out and danced with her best friend Claire. :)  It was fun and tiring by the end of the day as you can see in the last photo.

My Little Green Fairy

 We decided it was Penelope's turn for a costume since Kendyl got her Colonial dress and Makenzie got her Who costume. Pip declared she wanted to be a green fairy, to which I could think of nothing I wanted to sew more. I had fun following her around snapping pictures. Maybe I could create a cute top hat, feathery headband and she will be a perfect little floofy-leprechaun for Saint Patty's! See! I knew I could find a way to make it feel practical.... well more practical at least. 

Lunch Bag Friday: Valentine's, Braces and Plays

Seth drew these bags in honor of Valentine's Day, Kendyl's new braces, and Makenzie's play (in which she played a very cute Who member of Whoville last weekend).

This morning when Kendyl saw her bag she was really confused and declared that braces, "DO NOT FEEL LIKE A LONG BEAR HUG!" To which Seth replied that it was his wishful thinking they did. lol In her defense braces do hurt for a little while and it's especially hard to keep practicing your clarinet with a sore mouth. She is doing much better now though. Too bad in three weeks they get tightened again. lol

Kenzie helped make that adorable yellow dress by stuffing it with tulle, closing it up again, and attaching the fur. She also made a cute HUGE pearl necklace by painting wooden dowel ends white and stringing them like pearls. She was the darn cutest Who in the whole play. Of course I am her mother, but I did hear someone sitting behind us during the play say the same thing to the person they were sitting next to. smile emoticonhehehhe Love those kinds of moments.   

 Here's a pic of Kenzie before the performance with some of her best buddies that are in the play too.

Here's a family pic from after the play and like usual Pip was difficult during the play until she fell asleep in Seth's arms half way through.  Luckily he didn't get peed on while holding a sleeping kid during a play... that's happened before. hahaha

Hanging out at the diner after!  Makenzie's favorite part. :)

Playing Catch-up.... AGAIN :)

So it's been a while.  I think I go through seasons of liking to update my blog and not liking to.  I tend to post everything I make on facebook and forget to keep a better record of it here.  Anyway, here are some fairy shoes I made the past few months.

This one my daughter found while she was hunting for leprechaun treasure in the yard on Saint Patty's.  She figured finding one of their shoes as almost as good as their treasure. :)

I've been meaning to do something fun with this table for a while now.  For some reason I made it happen yesterday. hahahaha  I was walking past it in the morning and said to myself, "Ok.  Get out the paints and do it!"  So I did. :) 

I've been learning how to crochet from a cute lady at my church.  She has a goal to teach a bunch of us "youngsters" how to do it and then have us all make together 100 sets of these hats and booties to donate to the hospital across the street.  This was my first completed set.  I've made several more since, but then then started buying my own yarn and thinking it would be fun to alter the pattern a little to make a hat for Pip and her buddies. :)  Then I'll go back to making for the hospital again.

Kendyl loves to sit and make crochet chains, pull them all out and start over again.  She doesn't want to learn any other stitches yet.  hahaha  This is her sitting on the floor at church making her long snaky chains. :)

 Here's one of the hats I made for Pip.  Actually she is giving this one to her buddy.  She wants me to make her's with yarn that is more sparkly. hahaha  What a girly-girl.  LOVE IT! :)

Ok.  So there's more to update, but that's all I've got time for now.  Later!

Valentine Love Letters Decoration

The last week has been a lot of fun to find little love notes randomly throughout the day in our own envelope on this banner that I made. A few weeks ago I began sketching out this idea. Originally I was going to make it into an advent calendar, but my sister had a great idea to turn it into little pockets to keep love notes in. So I sketched it out and she did color tests and we decided on this! Man alive, I love that sister of mine and how fun it is to create stuff with her. Someday we'll live by each other again, but it's wonderful to be able to create together via the internet. :)

I have enough materials to custom make 3 more for anyone that would like to purchase it. I posted it on my etsy shop at: http://www.etsy.com/listing/91563034/owl-valentine-love-notes-banner

So here's the full view...

...and a close up on those two cute little love birds :)

This is the heart pocket that holds the papers to write on and the little red envelope holds our small pencils.

I LOVE the new embroidery machine I got for Christmas. It was really fun embroidering all our names and little designs on it and writing "Be Mine" with it. Those little Christmas tree advent calendars took about 3-4 hours just to embroider the numbers below the pockets. Now it's a cinch.